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I judge the actions of entire generations like this: What kind of society did they inherit? And what kind of society did they leave behind?
And by that yardstick, no generation has more thoroughly wrecked America than the Boomers........
While that yardstick of judging is admirably objective, it ignores global forces and global conditions. The unprecedented prosperity which our country enjoyed in the 50's and 60's could not have continued no matter what our politicians and other leaders did because the rest of the world recovered from its devastation.
Certain trends and policies may have made the economic deterioration worse and may have caused it to happen sooner and more quickly, but the general direction (the world-wide leveling which is still going on) was inevitable and unstoppable.
While that yardstick of judging is admirably objective, it ignores global forces and global conditions. The unprecedented prosperity which our country enjoyed in the 50's and 60's could not have continued no matter what our politicians and other leaders did because the rest of the world recovered from its devastation.
I think a lot of the younger people hating on the Boomers in this thread also forget that that period of unprecedented national prosperity occurred during the Boomers's childhoods. They entered into the workforce during the 70s and 80s, just when that prosperity was eroding in earnest. The Boomers never experienced that prosperity as adults; that would be the Silent Generation's good fortune.
I think a lot of the younger people hating on the Boomers in this thread also forget that that period of unprecedented national prosperity occurred during the Boomers's childhoods. They entered into the workforce during the 70s and 80s, just when that prosperity was eroding in earnest. The Boomers never experienced that prosperity as adults; that would be the Silent Generation's good fortune.
I think this was the certainly the case for me and my family, when I was ready to enter the workforce in the early sixties jobs weren't all that plentiful unless you had a degree or some salable skills. Having neither and hoping for an apprenticeship opening I bounced around a lot of low wage jobs until I could get into a training program.
I think many of the youth in America have been fed a line of BS that portrays their parents generation as the chosen ones, and not just a few million but EVERYONE born in that certain time frame.
With the specter of the draft and Vietnam (not to mention the fact that many felt the US war policies were the result of a corporatized government) made the sixties a volatile and corrosive decade and not one of smiley faces and financial prosperity.
The thing about this generational blame game that is truly sad lies in the fact of our children not knowing who to kick, one poster alludes to those who voted in the rot of politicians who ran things at a certain time as co conspirators to the general malaise, of course he doesn't have any explanation for those who didn't vote or felt compelled to vote because it is what we do in search of the lesser evil.
And even more apparent in this tragedy of blame is the fact that today's preschoolers will be blaming the Millennial's for their "role" in everything of a political or economic nature that they supposedly supported simply by being a certain age in a certain era.
To those who desire the broad brush stroke when applying blame for things I"ll simply say, step up for your fair share of the current blame, tell us your age and circumstance, let us know how you personally went to Washington and DEMANDED the policies that have directed your government during your adulthood, let us know how you personally went to Wall Street and DEMANDED the financial policies that served America, or brought some pain.
While that yardstick of judging is admirably objective, it ignores global forces and global conditions. The unprecedented prosperity which our country enjoyed in the 50's and 60's could not have continued no matter what our politicians and other leaders did because the rest of the world recovered from its devastation.
Certain trends and policies may have made the economic deterioration worse and may have caused it to happen sooner and more quickly, but the general direction (the world-wide leveling which is still going on) was inevitable and unstoppable.
There were better ways to deal with these global forces than embracing supply-side economics. And while trickle-down wasn't a Boomer concept, they voted for it en masse.
And now that our economy is thoroughly trashed, the nation is completely polarized, and nothing is getting done -- NOW they want to break out the guitars and sing Kumbaya (or sappy Genesis songs) when accused of being poor stewards.
They're quite happy to point fingers at anyone younger though, and accuse them of being lazy and entitled. That kind of generational conflict is fine. But not the kind of generational conflict where they might have to do a little introspection. That's the bad kind of generational conflict. The good kind of generational conflict is the kind where they get to be dismissive parents/grandparents.
Devil's advocate time -- what generation dominated the electorate when America switched over to a "corporate cabal of globalists?" (Only the oldest members of GenX were able to vote. And the few Millennials who were around at the time were in diapers.) Which generation bought into the idea of trickle-down economics, hook, line and sinker (and continues to preach this false economic "religion" to this day)?
I judge the actions of entire generations like this: What kind of society did they inherit? And what kind of society did they leave behind?
And by that yardstick, no generation has more thoroughly wrecked America than the Boomers. They may not have personally thrown the wrenches into the gears. But they voted for the people who did, and they continue to cheer for more of the same -- just read this forum for examples.
It would serve us all to have posters who feel a righteous generational condemnation is in order when things go wrong at the national level to reveal their own contribution to the current socioeconomic dilemmas facing us today. As for the politicians who do "throw wrenches into the gears" in the name of those they are supposed to serve all I can say is that very few people I know have been happy with all that these pols do regardless of party.
My dad voted for Nixon only to have huge regrets later, he also voted for Reagan and then saw him tear into unions under orders from his masters, he admitted his disappointment but said he couldn't have done things differently in light of the other party's differences with his own philosophy. I can't think of a single president who ever stated his desire to wage endless wars, help to ruin the economy, or enrich his masters in the upper class to our detriment, and yet every president has done some or all of those things.
Looking back I can see with absolute clarity those people who are worthy of some blame, and ironically enough it's the same characters we see in today's construct of finance, industry, media, the military, political think tanks, policy wonks, and various government and business administrative types who have always been the decision makers in America, NOT the people...
The excessive wages and other compensation started when Reagan, a non-Boomer, started to roll back income taxes. Then GW Bush, who stole 2 elections may I remind you, rolled back income taxes further, and almost halved the federal capital gains tax. Those measures are what caused excessive executive pay. However, most boomers are NOT executives, and are schlepping along in many instances worse than the generations after them. They went through a huge middle-management cutting phase sometime back in the 80's, and they've been booted out of their jobs as they pass 50, to make room for you whiners. They're not getting hired for hot new tech jobs, even if the re-tool, because they're too old, no one wants to hire them.
So, what were you saying about excessive wages?
Tell us why you think all Boomers were "twisted, politically correct, hedonistic, Godless, immoral and socialst". The Bushes were/are conservatives. What about all the Holy Rollers who got them voted in, and who took over Congress in the 90's? Most of those were Boomers. What about all the Repub candidates who want to continue slashing taxes and trashing the economy? Boomers. And btw, it's those leading Holy Rollers like Jerry Falwell who were so scandal-prone, failing to practice what they preached. Being into God has no bearing on morality, pal, wake up and smell the coffee. Did you notice the Catholics (among others) have been having a little problem in the morality department? And before you try to pin it on any particular generation, bear in mind it's been going on for about 1000 years.
Socialism? What socialism? You don't know what socialism is. You have no idea what you're talking about overall.
Very creative post. GWB won his elections legally as determined by the Supreme Court. Hanging chads were not meaningful. But that has nothing to do with generational politics, does it?
What is excessive pay exactly? Is there a threshold you can specify?
Do you have data that shows the so called Holy Rollers were mostly boomers? I think instead it is likely they were the previous generation.
In 1990, the oldest boomers were only 44 years told, the youngest boomers 26. My guess is that very few in Congress in 1995 were boomers. A cursory look at the 104th Congress shows that most of them are Silents (Feinstein, Boxer, Kerry, Kennedy, McConnell, Gramm, etc.
The first boomer Speaker of the House was Newt Gingrich (1995). The first boomer Senate Majority leader was Trent Lott (1997), and neither of these two lasted more than four years.
What is excessive pay exactly? Is there a threshold you can specify?
There's no need to agree on what the threshold exactly is because no matter how high you can reasonably set it at, upper tier pay (as represented by CEO compensation) is probably already past it. People should just call a spade a spade.
Just look up info about average American CEO pay ratios versus the average American worker (not minimum wage workers) and see how it has climbed over the years. For further comparison, compare it against today's CEOs from other nations with big name corporations like Austria, Germany and Japan.
I think it would be reasonable to cap CEO pay at 100x their average employee pay. If they want more, they could always buy company stock and collect share dividends.
Your logic is flawed. You group millions and millions of people into some nebulous abstract overall category based on a narrow range of dates and assign to them mystical powers and an "evil" designation under some philosophical label.
It wasn't the birth date. It must have been the Beatles lovers. No, the blue jeans.
Exactly. My father was born in 1945, served in the U.S. Army from 1962-1965, and was a hard-working, lifelong union member on the railway until he retired.
Perhaps the OP can explain how this makes him part of the problem generation he is ranting about.
Boomers seem to have no problems at all lumping all Millennials into a group and dismissing them as "lazy, entitled and spoiled." You can see countless examples on this thread and others. Are ALL Millennials lazy, entitled and spoiled? Of course not. Are SOME? Yes.
Personally, I don't think we're far enough along to make any broad, sweeping generalizations about Millennials.
But WE are far enough along to critique the actions of the Boomers. Compare the America they inherited in the 1950s and 1960s to the America that they're leaving behind. And then tell me why that generation was so flippin' great.
And that's the one thing they don't want to talk about. Try to steer the conversation in that direction, and they'll dig their heels in and demand that it was everyone except them who is responsible for America's tailspin over the past 40 years. They're blameless. Nothing at all to do with it. It must have been the Silent Generation. Or Gen X. Or the Millennials. Couldn't possibly be the Boomers. Oh, heavens no. They're basically the Greatest Generation, part II. Ask any of them. They'll tell you.
They're eager to take credit for lowering the voting age. (And they deserve credit for that.) And they want to take credit for civil rights. (And they deserve some credit for that, too.) But they don't want shoulder any blame for anything at all. Then it's someone else's problem. The "Me Generation" in a nutshell.
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